Project Impact

Inspiring People Making a Difference in the World

2020 - 2021

We are elated to announce our newest virtual program series Project Impact.

The Project Impact Series will include a diverse slate of the featured stories and moderators who are changemakers who will inspire each person in the audience to take ownership and accountability of challenges they presently see and take action to make a difference in their communities.

This four-part series will span topics from food insecurities, social justice, health and wellness to youth and education.

Episode #1: Action Against Hunger

October 27, 2020 | 12:00PM – 1:30PM EST

Hunger is a major public health concern in the United States impacting more than 50 million people and COVID-19 has added to the complexity of food access. This episode will highlight three inspirational individuals who will share their journey and how they are making a difference against hunger and food insecurities.

See below for details and event registration.

Moderated by

Thomas J. Tierney

Chairman and Co-founder

The Bridgespan Group

View Bio

Anne Hayes

Executive Director (Bio)

View Mission

Aidan Reilly

Co-founder (Bio)

View Mission

Ajay Relan

Founder (Bio)

View Mission

Episode #1

October 27, 2020

12:00PM – 1:30PM EST

Action Against Hunger

Ticket Pricing & Information

HBS Association of Boston Member: Complimentary

Non-Members: $20

Tickets & Registration

Episode #2

TBD

Social Justice

A better tomorrow requires new thought leaders with bold ideas for how social justice can impact the world for the better. In this session, we will hear from changemakers of tomorrow on how they are making a difference around social justice and equality for the future.

Panelists TBD

Episodes #3 and #4

Date TBD

Thomas Tierney

Chairman and Co-founder, The Bridgespan Group

Tom Tierney’s personal mission is to serve exceptional individuals and organizations to help them achieve breakthrough social impact. His professional experience spans a wide range: CEO, social entrepreneur, author, teacher, philanthropic advisor, and consultant. Over the past few decades, Tom’s work has generally focused in the areas of philanthropy and leadership, with a naturally strategic and intensely pragmatic orientation. He remains a creative, curious and avid learner.

Tom joined Bain & Company in 1980, and became partner three years later. From 1987 to 1992, he served as the Managing Director of Bain’s San Francisco office. In 1992, as the firm completed a management buyout, Tom became Bain’s president, reporting directly to acting CEO Mitt Romney. In 1993, Tom assumed full leadership responsibilities as Bain’s first Worldwide Managing Director. Under his leadership, Bain grew its revenues six-fold, while significantly expanding its global operations.

In 2000, Tom left his position as Bain’s CEO to co-found The Bridgespan Group, an independent nonprofit focused on helping philanthropists and nonprofit leaders achieve breakthrough results—while simultaneously generating practical knowledge shared freely across the social sector. In addition to nurturing Bridgespan’s growth and innovation, Tom concentrates on building platforms that will further enhance the flow and effectiveness of philanthropic funding. He also privately advises a select number of extraordinary philanthropists and nonprofit leaders.

Tom has co-authored two books, Aligning the Stars, published in April 2002 by Harvard Business School Press and Give Smart: Philanthropy That Gets Results, published in March 2011 by Public Affairs. He has written numerous articles, delivered countless speeches and been privileged to lecture at many fine universities, including Harvard and Stanford. Tom led the production of Conversations with Remarkable Givers, an unprecedented collection of insightful videos, drawn from dozens of interviews with philanthropists and foundation leaders.

Thomas Tierney was born in San Francisco, California. He received his BA in Economics with highest distinction from the University of California at Davis, where he worked his way through school. Upon graduation, he worked as bus driver, before landing a job as a field engineer for Bechtel in North Africa. He subsequently earned an MBA with distinction from the Harvard Business School. Tom was the fifth person to hold the class of 1951 Chair for the Study of Leadership at West Point; honorably following Jim Collins and coach “K” (Krzyzewski) in service of this outstanding institution. In 2016, he was the recipient of Harvard Business School’s esteemed Alumni Achievement Award.

Tom currently serves as Chair of eBay, Inc. as well as Chair of the Harvard Business School Social Enterprise Initiative. He has served on the boards of many accomplished nonprofit organizations, most recently as Chair of The Nature Conservancy, and Chair of Stanford’s Hoover Institution.

Tom is the proud father of two sons, Colin and Braden, and considers his wife of 36 years, Karen, his best friend and closest advisor.

Anne Hayes

Executive Director, The Food Project

Anne joined The Food Project as its Executive Director in February 2019. Her engagement with The Food Project goes back to 2009-2011, when she participated in two pro bono consulting projects for The Food Project through HBS Community Action Partners. Anne later joined the HBS-CAP board and her daughter ,Cassi, joined The Food Project. Cassi is an alumna of the youth programs and a former Crew Leader, who worked with The Food Project from 2011 to 2015.

Prior to joining The Food Project, Anne was the Chief Operating Officer at Trinity Boston Foundation, a non-profit with a mission to unlock opportunity and change the odds for youth of color in Boston. Over the course of her four years there, Anne supervised all aspects of the organization from youth development programs to organizational consulting, from finance and operations to development and communications. In addition, she led the process to develop the 2016-2020 strategic plan and was the Interim Executive Director in the summer of 2018.

Anne received her BA from Dartmouth College and her MBA from Harvard Business School. She worked in strategy consulting and brand management before shifting her focus to nonprofits.

In her spare time, Anne loves to garden and cook with veggies from her CSA share.

Aidan Reilly

Co-Founder, FarmLink

Aidan Reilly is a rising senior at Brown University studying Political Science with a concentration in comparative politics. Born in Los Angeles, California, Aidan’s primary interests have largely centered around documentary filmmaking. As reflected in his past work covering the 2018 Nicaraguan Civil Crisis and the ongoing Syrian Refugee Crisis, Aidan has a passion for finding ways the everyday person can resonate with seemingly vast and unsolvable problems.

This interest manifested at the onset of the COVID-19 Pandemic with his co-creation of the FarmLink Project, an initiative aiming to motivate everyday Americans to fight both food waste and food insecurity in the United States.

Since its beginnings in April of 2020, Farmlink has grown from a small network of college students to a nationwide movement to fix the broken food system in the United States. In the last 6 months, the project has utilized the help of 200 full-time volunteers (average age: 21) to save 13 million lbs of produce from going to waste, and instead get it to communities in need across 40 states.

In addition, the project has been able to pay nearly 1 million dollars in wages to farm workers. The ultimate goal of Farmlink is to democratize access to fresh produce to underserved communities for years to come.

Ajay Relan

Co-Creator of #HashtagLunchbag

Ajay Relan – Los Angeles raised Entrepreneur, Investor – Co-creator of #HashtagLunchbag, a grassroots, social-media based movement that brings diverse groups of people together and leverages the power of community to address food insecurity and bring awareness to homelessess in independently organized party driven atmospheres in over 150 cities around the world to date.

Founding General Partner of Queensbridge Venture Partners and currently buliding Slauson & Co, a South Los Angeles based venture firm focused on deploying capital in early stage entrepreneurs from underrepresented backgrounds.

Serial entrepreneur with branding, marketing, and entertainment background. Most recently co-founded Hilltop Coffee + Kitchen, a mission driven retail coffee concept that empowers local entrepreneurs and creators in South Los Angeles.

The Food Project

thefoodproject.org

The Food Project’s mission is to create a thoughtful and productive community of youth and adults from diverse backgrounds who work together to build a sustainable food system.

Our community produces healthy food for residents of the city and suburbs, provides youth leadership opportunities, and inspires and supports others to create change in their own communities.

FarmLink

farmlinkproject.org

The FarmLink Project is an initiative aiming to motivate everyday Americans to fight both food waste and food insecurity in the United States.

#HastagLunchbag

hashtaglunchbag.org

#HashtagLunchbag, a grassroots, social-media based movement that brings diverse groups of people together and leverages the power of community to address food insecurity and bring awareness to homelessess in independently organized party driven atmospheres in over 150 cities around the world to date.

Stacey Boyd

Founder and CEO, Olivela

Educator and entrepreneur Stacey Boyd founded Olivela, a luxury retailer with doing good built into every transaction, in 2017. The idea came to her after a trip with Malala Yousafzai to the Dadaab refugee camp in Kenya, where she met girls who were risking their lives for the opportunity to get an education.

Upon her return, Stacey met with many of the world’s finest luxury brands and explored the creation of a site harnessing their artistry and craftsmanship and our collective purchasing power to support girls’ education internationally. Over 200 luxury brands are now a part of Olivela. Twenty percent of every purchase made on the site goes toward making sure girls who might otherwise be denied schooling have access to this life-changing opportunity.

Boyd earned her MBA and Masters in Public Policy from Harvard. Boyd has launched a number of successful ventures including the Academy of Pacific Rim, Project Achieve and Schoola, an online retailer that sells gently- worn clothing to support schools in need. She serves on the National Council on Teacher Quality, advises PBS on educational programming and was named one of World Economic Forum’s 100 Global Leaders of Tomorrow. Boyd’s work has been featured by CNN, PBS, The TODAY Show, The Wall Street Journal, The New Yorker, Wired, USA TODAY, The Washington Post and numerous other publications.

Geryn Evans

CEO and Founder, Project Blu

Geryn is the CEO and Founder of Project Blu, a revolutionary pet brand that is driving positive change within the pet industry.

Project Blu converts a range of polluting materials into top-quality pet accessories including pet beds, collars, leashes and harnesses. The raw materials include ocean-bound plastic, discarded fishing nets, recycled leather and textiles.

Most recently the team has developed the first range of ‘eco-leather’ pet products that are made by converting discarded apple skins into a super strong and resilient material. The leather industry is one of the most harmful industries on our plant and Project Blu is on a mission to deliver positive change for pets, people and the planet.

Since officially launching in May 2019, Project Blu has sold over 80,000 products across the globe. Their work has converted over 6 million plastic bottles into sustainable designs.

The company was recently named the ‘Best Start-up in Wales’ 2020 and has received the backing from Mars inc as part of the LEAP Ventures Studio.

After COVID related delays Project Blu will be launching in the US in January 2021 alongside our strategic partners Metamorphosis.

Dan Letchinger

Senior Vice President, Dave’s Killer Bread

A marketing leader with over a decade of experience in the organic and natural food space, Dan started at Dave’s Killer Bread in 2009 as a bread slicer, two years after the brand debuted at the Portland Farmers Market.

Dan worked closely with the founding family to grow the business with killer products and a powerful purpose: employing people with criminal backgrounds who are ready to turn their lives around for the better.

Since Dave’s Killer Bread was acquired by Flowers Foods (NYSE: FLO) in 2015, Dan has worked in various positions of marketing leadership while the brand has grown to be recognized as the #1 organic bread in the United States and one of the fastest growing brands in the entire category.

Today Dan is senior vice president of Flowers Foods’ growth brands, including Dave’s Killer Bread and Canyon Bakehouse Gluten Free. He is a board member of the Dave’s Killer Bread Foundation, which inspires other businesses to be Second Chance Employers.

A graduate of Grinnell College, Dan received an executive certificate in project management from UC Berkeley in 2014. He lives with his family in Portland, Oregon.

Kenny Dichter

Wheels Up Founder & CEO

Kenny Dichter is the Founder and CEO of Wheels Up, a leading membership-based private aviation company. Started in 2013, Wheels Up has become the fastest-growing brand in the space, delivering a total aviation solution with three membership options—as well as renowned events and benefits. The Company reduces the cost to fly privately while offering unparalleled safety, service, and flexibility to over 6,000 members across North America.

Having now combined with Delta Private Jets and entered into a groundbreaking partnership with Delta Air Lines, Wheels Up offers one of the world’s largest owned and managed fleets of private aircraft, standing at nearly 200 planes. Members benefit from availability up to 365 days a year, with as little as 24 hours’ notice. Through the Exclusive Fleet, Core and Business Members receive guaranteed access to the King Air 350i with dynamic pricing backed by capped hourly rates, plus as-available access to the Citation Excel and Citation X with dynamic pricing. Via the Program Fleet, they have guaranteed access to 1,250+ safety-vetted partner operator jets—with dynamic pricing and capped hourly rates. Connect Members have as-available access to both fleets. Members also enjoy benefits such as Delta SkyMiles, Medallion Status, and the ability to use Wheels Up Fund Programs to pay for both Wheels Up private flights and Delta commercial flights.

In 2001, Dichter founded Marquis Jet, introducing the first-ever fractional jet card program, which revitalized and democratized private aviation. Led by Dichter, Marquis generated over $4 billion in revenue, culminating in its 2010 sale to NetJets, owned by Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway. Dichter was named Vice Chairman of NetJets and significantly contributed to its development, leveraging relationships with CEOs, entrepreneurs, athletes, and tastemakers.

Dichter has played an active role and invested in Juice Press, a grab-and-go, organic food and juice company that grew from 1 Manhattan store to 86 U.S. locations. In 2010, he co-founded Tequila Avion, an ultra-premium brand acquired by Pernod Ricard in 2014 for over $100 million.

Dichter also founded Tour GCX Partners, Inc., a golf membership program providing client entertainment solutions, which was sold to Century Golf in 2018. In 1996, he co-founded Alphabet City, a sports marketing and music company acquired by SFX Entertainment in 1998. A regular on CNBC’s “Squawk Box,” Dichter is sought after by media outlets for his perspectives on aviation, consumer brands, and luxury goods and services.

Dichter chairs the Council of Advocates at New York’s Mount Sinai Hospital, working with Dr. Ken Davis, Mount Sinai’s Chairman and CEO, and serves on the Board of the Jack Martin Fund, working with the pediatric oncology department. Dichter is a major supporter of his alma mater, University of Wisconsin-Madison. He is married and is the proud father of three daughters.

Kara Goldin

Founder & CEO, Hint, Inc.

Kara Goldin is the Founder and CEO of Hint, Inc., best known for its award-winning Hint® water, the leading unsweetened flavored water.

She has received numerous accolades, including being named EY Entrepreneur of the Year 2017 Northern California, one of InStyle’s 2019 Badass 50, Fast Company’s Most Creative People in Business, WWD Beauty Inc.’s Feel Good Force and Fortune’s Most Powerful Women Entrepreneurs. The Huffington Post listed her as one of six disruptors in business, alongside Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg.

Previously, Kara was VP of Shopping and Ecommerce at America Online where she helped lead the growth of its shopping and ecommerce business to over a $1 billion in revenue.

She is an active speaker and writer and, in 2017, she launched Unstoppable with Kara Goldin, a podcast where she interviews founders, entrepreneurs and disruptors across various industries. Kara’s first book, Undaunted, published by Harper Leadership, will be released in October 2020.

Kara lives in the Bay Area with her family.

Please follow Kara on her website at www.karagoldin.com and on all social channels @KaraGoldin

For more information, images, interviews, please contact press@drinkhint.com

David Wagner

Executive Vice President, Global Strategy & Growth Platforms

David Wagner is Executive Vice President, Global Strategy and Growth Platforms at VF Corporation. He has more than 15 years of experience in a variety of strategy positions.

In his current role, David is responsible for leading VF’s Strategy, Consumer Insights and Innovation functions. He and his team work closely with VF’s business unit leaders and Senior Leadership Team to activate new consumer and market insights, to articulate and drive progress against VF’s strategy, and to support VF brand revenue growth across multiple innovation platforms.

Prior to his role, David served as Vice President, Corporate Strategy from 2017 to
2018 and as Vice President, Strategy and Integrated Planning from 2013 to 2017.
From 2010 to 2014, he was Vice President of Strategy for VF International in the
company’s Lugano, Switzerland office. In Europe, he established the strategy and
insights functions for VF EMEA and supported the development of VF’s Asia strategy capability. David has been with the company since 2006 in a variety of strategy positions with increasing responsibilities.

Prior to joining VF, David worked in private equity for Banc of America Capital
Investors and as a consultant for McKinsey and Co.
He has a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration from the University of North Caroline at Chapel Hill, where he graduated Phi Beta Kappa and with Highest Distinction, and a Master of Business Administration degree from Harvard Business School.

Bob Lord

SVP Cognitive Applications, Blockchain and Ecosystems, IBM

Bob Lord is one of the world’s leading authorities on emerging technologies and open platforms to transform how businesses engage with customers.

Bob is Senior Vice President, Cognitive Applications, Blockchain, and Ecosystems at IBM, where he is responsible for infusing emerging and open technologies across the business. He oversees IBM’s market-leading blockchain business and drives the company’s key partner ecosystems across developers, global systems integrators and independent software vendors, which help clients accelerate their journey to the cloud and gain competitive advantage.

He was appointed in 2016 by IBM's ninth CEO Ginni Rometty as the company’s first Chief Digital Officer with a mission to change how IBM innovation is delivered and consumed by the world’s leading organizations.

Bob rebuilt IBM’s digital platforms on Red Hat OpenShift to make it more efficient for clients and partners to innovate and deploy solutions at scale. He focuses on breaking down silos, establishing agile practices and instilling a startup mentality throughout the 109-year-old company while transforming how IBM engages with clients.

At the center of this work is a commitment to the developers and data scientists of the open source community. Bob oversees IBM’s leadership and participation in dozens of open source communities, contribution and donation of open source code, and overall industry advocacy.

In 2018 Bob launched Call for Code, a major initiative to give developers and data scientists access to IBM tools and technologies as a means to solve global, societal challenges. In collaboration with the United Nations Human Rights and The Linux Foundation, IBM helps the world’s 24 million developers use these technologies to address society’s most pressing concerns: the growing threat of climate change and mitigating the spread of COVID-19. Since launch, over 300,000 developers and problem solvers from over 168 nations built solutions for an immediate and lasting impact in society.

In collaboration with leading relief organizations, the winning solutions are further developed through IBM Code and Response, a four-year initiative to build, fortify, test and deploy open technology to serve communities in need of critical aid.

Prior to IBM, Bob served as President of AOL, leading the company through its evolution into a leading, global advertising platform. He also served as CEO of Razorfish, a pioneering digital transformation consultancy helping companies like Cisco, Condé Nast, Ford, Mercedes-Benz and Pfizer redefine their brands for the digital age. He captured his experiences at Razorfish in the book he co-authored, Converge: Transforming Businesses at the Intersection of Marketing and Technology.

Bob’s experience and passion made him an active member of the TED community, board member for Aqua Finance, a Blackstone Company, and former board member for Williams-Sonoma and Screen Vision Media.

He began his career as an engineer, graduating from Syracuse University with a BS in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research, before graduating with an MBA from Harvard University.

He shares his passion for discovery with his wife and three children, and competitively participates in a number of outdoor activities and sports.

Virginie Helias

P&G Chief Sustainability Officer & VP Global Sustainability

With 29 years of experience at Procter & Gamble in Brand Management and
Innovation, Virginie has a broad experience across multiple categories and
global to local brand management expertise across several of P&G multi-
billion dollar brands (Pantene, Ariel/Tide, Pampers). She has international
experience (France, UK, Switzerland and the United States).

Prior to her current position, she was the Western Europe Franchise Leader
for Ariel, one of P&G largest brands, where she turned Ariel into the leader in
Sustainability through the launch of the highly successful “Cool Clean/Turn to
30” campaign and the most sustainable laundry product (Excel Gel).

Beyond her brand and innovation expertise, she is also recognized for her
visioning, change management and leadership development skills. She is a
certified coach.

In July 2011, she recommended the creation of a new position — Global
Sustainability Brand Director, working across all P&G business units and
regions. Her mission was to embed sustainability into the innovation, brand-
building and everyday business practices at P&G. In July 2016, she was
promoted to Vice President of Global Sustainability, in recognition of the
work she has led to make sustainability a core business strategy, an
innovation driver and a catalyst for a more resilient organization.

Virginie lives in Geneva, Switzerland, with her husband and 3 children. She is a
marathon runner.

Larry Gulko

Brand Strategist and Executive Coach

Larry is a brand architect and strategist, executive coach, and growth advisor with a track record for positioning an eclectic range of brands to compete more effectively in today’s rapidly evolving and ever-changing business landscape.

He founded and moderates the annual CEO Brand Leadership Roundtable with the Harvard Business School Association of Boston, now celebrating its 12th year. This popular program has showcased over 50 CEOs of iconic and leading brands including Dunkin’ Brands, Keurig, Ritz- Carlton, NBC Sports, Harley-Davidson, PGA of America, Girl Scouts, Joseph Abboud, Zumba, Talbots, Newman’s Own, TaylorMade Golf, Life is good. The Fireside Chat event has featured Hall of Fame PGA Golfer and Entrepreneur Greg Norman, and Ed Bastian, CEO, Delta Air Lines.

Larry created BRAND: NEW DAY, the only one-day brand building and idea exchange retreat experience designed exclusively for an individual company’s senior leadership team looking to take a fresh look at their brand and determined to take it to the next level. This one-of-a-kind company focused program is based on a proven concept originally created in tandem with the Disney Institute. Under the BRAND: NEW DAY umbrella is Brand Dive, an immersive C-Level thought leadership roundtable emulating an open-enrollment idea exchange with peers.

He and Roger Berkowitz, CEO of Legal Sea Foods, host Name Brands, CBS Boston. This insightful and entertaining brand leadership podcast show features in-studio conversations with iconic brands and CEOs who share their insight to build best-selling brands, dominate categories, and drive brand performance and business growth.

For 20 years, Larry’s advertising and brand consultancy agency, Gulko & Company, launched over 25 brands for the Fortune 500, middle-market companies, entrepreneurial ventures, and non-profits.

A sought-after thought leader, he has delivered numerous keynotes, commencement addresses, is a MassChallenge business mentor and judge and has lectured at the Babson College Graduate School of Business and Executive Education Program.

Larry is an advisor to the C-level community and has served on boards and committees including Babson Advisory Council, ASAE & The Center for Association Leadership, The American Marketing Association, Gifting Brands, The George Washington University, and Boston Children’s Hospital.

Ed Bastian

CEO Delta Airlines

As CEO of Delta Air Lines, Ed Bastian leads a team of 90,000 global professionals that is building the world’s premier international airline, powered by a people-driven, customer-focused culture and spirit of innovation.

A 20-year Delta veteran, Ed has been a critical leader in Delta’s long-term strategy and champion of putting Delta’s shared values of honesty, integrity, respect, perseverance and servant leadership at the core of every decision.

Since being named Delta’s CEO in May 2016, Ed has expanded Delta’s leading position as the world’s most reliable airline while growing its global footprint and enhancing the customer experience in the air and on the ground. During his tenure as CEO, Delta has become the world’s most awarded airline, having been named the Wall Street Journal’s top U.S. airline; Fortune’s most admired airline worldwide; the most on-time global airline by FlightGlobal; a Glassdoor Employee’s Choice company and more. Delta has returned to sustained profitability, regaining its investment-grade credit rating with all three major ratings agencies and paying out more than $1 billion in profit-sharing to employees every year over the past four years. In 2018, Fortune magazine named Ed among “The World’s 50 Greatest Leaders,” and in 2019, he was elected to the membership of the Council on Foreign Relations.

When asked to sum up his job in five words, Ed’s response is: “Taking care of our people.” The answer reflects his leadership philosophy, which is based on the “virtuous circle” – if you take care of your people, they take care of your customers, whose business and loyalty allows you to reward your investors.

Ed joined Delta in 1998 as Vice President – Finance and Controller and was promoted to Senior Vice President in 2000. He left Delta in 2005 and became Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Acuity Brands. He returned to Delta six months later to become Chief Financial Officer, and in 2007 was appointed to serve as Delta’s President.

Prior to joining Delta, Ed held senior finance positions at Frito-Lay International and Pepsi-Cola International. Ed started his career with Price Waterhouse where he became an audit partner in its New York practice.

Ed grew up in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., and graduated from St. Bonaventure University with a Bachelor’s Degree in Business Administration. He lives in Atlanta, and is deeply involved in his faith, family and community.

Follow Ed on LinkedIn and Instagram for his thoughts on leadership, culture, aviation and more.

Simon Mainwaring

CEO, We First

Simon Mainwaring is the founder and CEO of We First, a strategic consultancy that accelerates growth and impact for purpose-driven brands. He is a member of the Advisory Council of Conscious Capitalism LA, the Advisory Board of Sustainable Brands, The Forbes Business Council, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts in London.

As a global keynote speaker, New York Times bestselling author, and highly-awarded brand futurist, he works with leading CEO’s, CMOs, and entrepreneurs to define their business strategy, company culture, and brand communications.

Simon was a finalist for Global Australian of the Year in 2015 and interim CMO at TOMS, received the MAKE CHANGE, ‘Conscious Leadership’ Award for 2016, a finalist for the Conscious Company Leadership Awards in 2017, and a Real Leaders Top 100 Visionary Leader in 2018. His company We First was included in Real Leaders list for the Top 100 Impact Companies in the US for 2018 and We First was a B Corps ‘Best for The World’ Honoree in 2019. He is a Jury Member of PRWeek’s ‘Purpose Awards’ in 2020 and a Jury Member at the Cannes Lions Festival for the Sustainable Development Goals in 2021.

Christina Thirkell

Director of Strategic Programs and Initiatives

Christina is an accomplished business, marketing and nonprofit executive with over 25 years of experience. She currently works as Director of Strategic Programs at Harvard Business School Association of Boston where for the past five years has developed programs and corporate partners for organizational growth. Prior to joining Harvard Business School Association of Boston, she spent 9 years as Executive Director at Expect Miracles Foundation – Financial Services Against Cancer. At the Foundation, Christina led the overall strategy, programs, operations, strategic and corporate sponsorships with over 100 top financial firms and C-Suite executives in the country. She developed and launched the first Executive Giving Program that today generates significant funds to support its national grants program. Her expertise in integrated corporate communications, public relations, business development, brand marketing and fundraising was instrumental in taking a local Boston based charity golf event in 2004 with one employee, to a national, nonprofit organization, growing the Foundation 450% in revenue and expanded to over 5 national events a year throughout her tenure.

Prior to Expect Miracles Foundation, Christina was Director of Global Public Relations at Giga Information Group where she worked for over 5 years. She was responsible for all global media relations, public relations and investor relations for the analyst firm where she reported to the CEO and other key executives before the firm was acquired by Forrester Research in 2003. Shortly after Christina was recruited to assist in the development of the first Diversity & Inclusion Initiative at Massport.

In her earlier career, Christina worked in the advertising agency industry in both Account Management and Research & Planning where she had a strong focus on consumer brands in the sporting goods industry.

She has been involved with several nonprofit organizations, board positions and committees at MSPCA, The Zakim Center at Dana Farber Cancer Institute, NY Wild Film Festival, 100 Women Who Care, and relief efforts in Haiti.

John Stephans

CEO, Avedis Zildjian Company

John joined Zildjian in 2017 and is responsible for the overall strategic direction and performance of the company’s worldwide operations.

The Zildjian Company has been synonymous with setting the standard for the development and manufacture of high performance musical instruments since 1623.

As the world’s leading maker of cymbals, drum sticks and percussion mallets, Zildjian products are sold across the globe, under the Zildjian, Vic Firth and Balter brands, and are the standard to which all other cymbals, drumsticks and mallets are measured. From the beginner to the world’s greatest rock stars, jazz performers and concert percussionists, amateurs and pros alike chose Zildjian products to allow them to experience and share the joy of music.

Zildjian Company he world’s largest producer of cymbals and drumsticks and the oldest family business in the United States. Founded in 1623, the company is currently owned by the 14^thand 15^th generations of Zildjian family.

In addition, John works closely with the Zildjian family to ensure alignment of the company’s goals with that of ownership. Under John’s leadership the company fully integrated operations from its acquisition of the Vic Firth Company, strengthened its leadership team and has driven increased new product activity which has resulted in the company exceeding current industry growth trends.

Prior to joining Zildjian, John was CEO of IdeaPaint, the inventor of the dry erase paint category, where he and his team reversed negative sales trends to grow the business over 50%. Prior to IdeaPaint, John held senior management positions at Ocean Spray and at Gillette. Prior to embarking on a business career, John spent time on athletic fields across the northeast as college lacrosse coach.

John received his BA from Clark University and his MBA from Babson College. He lives in eastern Massachusetts with his wife Kate and two boys.